The core purpose that must drive us

Yesterday I tried and tried to write a post about Donald Trump.  I tried the angle of how his mode of articulation betrays his essential shallowness. ("I think religion is a wonderful thing.") ("I have a great relationship with the blacks.") ("[Latin America] is not sending us the right people.") ("Krauthammer is a dummy.") I tried the angle of the absence of evidence of any real appreciation for, and understanding of, America's founding principles. I tried the angle of the vulgarity of his braggadocio.  I tried the angle of the shallowness of the parade of women in his life.

But I realize that Donald Trump's ability to make the splash that he does is but another manifestation of where we are collectively in post-America.  (See post below.) There is no shortage of vulgar, shallow opportunists chomping at the bit to shape public policy and cultural trends in our sad land.

Again, as has been the case for the last few Independence Days, I mark the holiday's approach with none of that old-school excitement. The spirits of Jefferson and Madison are nearly impossible to discern in the present atmosphere we breathe.  There is no regard for self-evident truths, there is no sense of gratitude to Nature's God for the three gifts that Mr. Jefferson took care to enumerate in his thunderous document.

The essential stuff - the spiritual stuff - that one finds in the guts and hearts of great and good leaders is only found in the tier of statesmen least likely to rise to positions of supreme influence.  In their stead, we find preening empty suits who allow us to reach this juncture:

A tryptic of cynical indifference has further reminded me that nobody in the USG gives a flying canary whether the people do well, prosper or even survive. Much of the US border remains more wide open than Debbie when she done did Dallas. An independent inspection determined that 95% of a sample of fake bombs or weapons got past the TSA at various airports nationwide.  The OPM was successfully hacked and every USG Federal Employee has had their PII* potentially stolen by foreign agents. And does any post-modern American even figuratively commit seppuku for this? 

The attitude of complete indifference to their mandate that our governing officials put on brazen display is far more distressing than any of the three failures I alluded to above. There is an arrogance and a sense of entitlement that has made the thoughtful among us saddened and a bit sick for lo the years. 

William Murchison at Real Clear Politics asks us to consider that someone - more than likely from the tier least equipped to deal with it - will assume responsibility for a culture, society and nation thus beset:

 1. The parlous condition of the Middle East. President Obama acknowledges we have no strategy for countering ISIS. American leadership, as distinguished from overlordship, needs restoration -- boots on the ground or not, though how you do it without boots I can't imagine.

2. Recent reshufflings of alliances and friendship aren't working. We need to acknowledge as of old the consonance of U.S.-Israeli interests and the non-consonance, for most purposes, of American-Iranian interests. Put it this way: The Israelis are the good guys of the Middle East; the Iranians --well, pffffft!

3. Czar Vladimir Putin seems to have in mind the re-yoking of Russia's neighbors to the Russian ox cart. What does it take to show us that Putin can be trusted as far as anyone can throw a grand piano? American-European unity with the Ukraine and the Baltic countries against Putin's disgraceful designs is of the essence.

4. At home, the biggest problem isn't political; it's moral, conjoined to politics. There isn't much comity among Americans -- less so now than maybe since the pre-1861 period, due to our current gift for using politics as a blunt instrument against the differently minded. We're engaged, whether we know it or not, in extinguishing freedom of thought and speech. The Supreme Court is about to tell us what marriage really "means." Universities put out a crabbed narrative about American guilt for every defect in the modern world: "racism," "sexism," "environmental depredation." America can't catch a break from the hoity-toity thinkers of academe (and the media), who know what a bunch of bums Americans were for most of their history.

5. Naturally this doesn't do a lot for education and intellectual inquiry. Personal identity appears to count more than knowledge or accomplishment.

6. Family -- one of the great "schools" of civilization -- is in disorder as many shun the old structures that supposedly compromise "freedom."

7. The economy! What's all this to do with jobs and pay?! Only everything. A people characterized by decency and common sense can do anything, including make a living. Otherwise, forget it.

And those being led are increasingly disinclined to see any venerable institutions providing a way out of the morass:

Americans have little confidence in most of their major institutions including Congress, the presidency, the Supreme Court, banks and organized religion, according to the latest Gallup poll.

"Americans' confidence in most major U.S. institutions remains below the historical average for each one," a Gallup spokesman said in a news release. Only the military, in which 72 percent of Americans express confidence, up from a historical average of 68 percent, and small business, with 67 percent confidence, up from 63, are currently rated higher than their historical norms. This is based on the percentage expressing "a great deal" or "quite a lot" of confidence in these institutions, the Gallup spokesman said.

Note the inclusion, in the list of institutions experiencing record-low confidence, of what ought to he the anchor of a society yearning to regain its health:

Americans have less confidence in organized religion today than ever measured before — a sign that the church could be "losing its footing as a pillar of moral leadership in the nation's culture," a new Gallup survey finds.

It's not that there aren't forces striving to counter this downward spiral. Eloquent pundits, committed and effective activist groups, conferences where citizens of such persuasion gather and imbue their efforts with the synergy of collective energy, and those few willing to step forward into roles of official governance are still in abundance.

But the task before us is not to fix a few nagging problems, after which we will have "made America great again."  What has been given to us to do is no less herculean than to save Western civilization from its death throes.

That must be our purpose, whatever our role.  And let us take its full measure, so that it guides us away from distraction and infatuation.

It is very late in the day.